Chapter 1
Bee
“Bee. Get in here. Right now.”
Loora’s voice cuts through Athena’s glass front door before I even badge in. My tote slides off my shoulder, my coffee sloshes dangerously close to the quarterly reports tucked against my ribs, and I shove the door open with my hip before caffeine, common sense, or basic self-preservation can stop me. She stands three feet away, all long limbs, lavender glasses, and panic wrapped in lip gloss. Both hands clamp around my arm.
“The prince is here,” she says.
I blink at her. My brain offers nothing helpful, which is rude considering I fed it coffee less than ten minutes ago.
“The Ak Layn,” she hisses. “Skylor Ak Layn. Alien royalty. Corporate executioner. Cheekbones registered as a public safety hazard. He is here, in this building, on the forty-seventh floor, right now.”
I set my coffee on the edge of my desk before I wear it. “Good morning to you too.”
“Did you not get my message last night?”
“I got it.” My bag lands on my chair. “I was buried in those quarterly reports Todd called me about at nine p.m., because apparently reasonable human beings wait until bedtime to discover numbers exist. I was up until three fixing his math. Again.”
“Forget Todd. Forget the reports.” Her eyes drag over me from my curls to my flats with the grim focus of a surgeon assessing a very ugly wound. “What is on your body right now, Beatrice?”
“Clothes, Loora.”
“Barely.”
I look down at myself. Black slacks. White blouse. Cardigan the color of printer paper. Comfortable flats that have survived rain, subway stairs, and one office holiday party where Todd made everyone play team-building charades. “I came to work. Not audition for intergalactic wife number six.”
Her mouth twitches. “First of all, nobody has confirmed the wife rumors.”
“That sounds like something wife number five would say.”
“Second, you’re going to be in the meeting.”
Everything inside me stops. The copy machine whirs behind us. Someone laughs near the art department. Farther down the hall, Todd’s office door clicks shut with the particular smugness only Todd and expensive coffins can manage.
“No,” I say.
Loora’s chin lifts, proud, satisfied and a little dangerous all at once. “Yes.”
“The meeting is for the editor.” I grab my coffee again because my hands need a job. “Todd goes upstairs, smiles his expensive little smile, and I sit at my desk pretending I don’t know this magazine is on fire.”
“That was before.”
“Before what?”
“Before Skylor Ak Layn’s assistant called down and asked for the editor and the assistant editor responsible for the quarterly analysis.”
I stare at her. She smiles. It is not comforting.
“Oh my God,” I say. “Loora, what did you do?”
“I told the truth.”
“Which truth? There are several, and most of them could get us sued.”
“I told his assistant that Todd didn’t compile the reports. You did.”
My lungs forget their employment contract. “Loora.”
